Hawksworth C Of E Primary School

The topic was ‘plants and animals’ and the activities were intended to support literacy, drama and art and design. Specific objectives were:

• to find out how to make different kinds of marks using different tools and media, such as feathers and paint
• to look at the marks that have been made, see what they remind us of, then make more marks to make the picture better
• to work together to make big drawings and learn from each other

Session 1
Experiments included: do it wrong on purpose; draw behind your back; draw with your eyes shut; put powder paint on the paper, then drip water and PVA on top; sniff, feel and listen to an object in a bag, then draw what you felt, smelled and heard; then look at the object and make another drawing.

To develop drawings, pupils were asked to consider: what does it look like? Are there any surprises? How can you make it better? Pupils were asked to revisit an experimental drawing and make it into a picture.

Pattern-partnered drawings were created by joining together drawings done by two different people. Then the partners drew on them to fuse them together to create a new drawing.

The idea was to use drawing to help the children become familiar with the story of Jack and the Beanstalk and to stimulate story telling through working together. The class drew with pencil and crayon on a roll of cream paper to suggest growth and direction. They then made experimental drawings using feathers and ink. During the lunch break, the children played Jack and the Beanstalk. They were proud of their work and invited children from other classes to come and see their beanstalk. Some brought their parents to see it.

Pupils reported:

I really enjoyed today.
I liked using the feathers because it was like in the olden days.
I liked the gunpowder paint because I could mix all the colours together.
I want to do more art! What are we doing next time?

Session 2
Jack’s Magic Beanstalk was an incredible plant that grew around the classroom, imitating the way a plant will find room to grow. Paper covered the walls as the children followed each other’s charcoal lines. The beanstalk sprouted collaged shoots. Flowers, insects and birds, and items that the giant had dropped, such as golden eggs and coins.

Session 3
The children worked cooperatively, with much talking and listening as well as drawing. They were asked to visualise characters in the story and decide on things they might have said. The pupils were asked: What would they wear? How did they look? What did they feel? The children worked in three groups to make a large-scale drawing, using collage, inks and other techniques they had used in previous sessions. In later sessions, they changed the scale of their drawings and made small concertina books in the shape of the bean to re-tell and illustrate the story. The children made dialogue scrolls using quill pens on cartridge paper. They then worked in one of three groups to: design and make settings; to develop characters; to create large-scale drawing. By the end of the day, all the children knew the story by heart. They particularly enjoyed re-enacting the story and working together and seeing their work become part of the big picture.

Reflection
Drawing supported verbal literacy skills of understanding a story, speaking and listening, sequencing a narrative, descriptive writing and characterisation as well as visual literacy skills of illustration and narrative drawing. Links were made with IT in annotating a fantasy animal that lived in the beanstalk and with science in creating a labelled diagram to explain what a magic bean needs to grow. The children were encouraged to explore and experiment, to learn new techniques and to cooperate with each other. They have adopted these approaches in subsequent work. The children enjoyed the project very much and the teacher learned techniques that she will use again, being more aware of how drawing can be used in a range of curriculum areas. She reports that I have got lots of new and good ideas through sharing practice with other teachers and artists on the project. She made a presentation to the rest of the school staff to share her experience and to support others with less confidence in using drawing.